The official Blog for bikewalklee.org. BikeWalkLee is a community coalition raising public awareness and advocating for complete streets in Lee County, FL.

Monday, March 7, 2016

BikeWalkLee supports Southwest Coastal Regional Trail

Vision of Florida interconnected trail system

It's exciting to see the vision of a Florida statewide system of interconnected trails beginning to take shape. The first section of this network is well underway--the 275 mile Coast-to-Coast Trail from St. Petersburg to Cape Canaveral National Seashore.

For the past two years, Lee and Collier County MPOs developed and approved the route for our section of the Southwest Coastal Regional Trail, which is now vying with many other potential trail segments to be the next priority regional trail segment (after the Coast to Coast Connector) to move forward. In 2015, the Florida legislation created a new program called SUNTrails (Shared-Use Nonmotorized (SUN) Trail Network, to be managed by FDOT with an annual funding level of $25 million.

Lee Co. segment of SW Coastal Regional Trail

A broad alliance comprised of the Tampa Bay Area Regional Transportation Authority (TBARTA) and the nine MPOs in Southwest Florida are working together to push for the Southwest Coastal Regional Trail as the next trail segment to be chosen by the Florida Greenways and Trails Council. If selected it would begin to receive funding from FDOT's SUNTrails program. The Southwest Coastal Regional Trail is part of the "shortlist" of 7 trails selected for further evaluation. The Council will soon pick it's top recommended trail and submit it to FDOT for selection. We have our collective fingers crossed. A special thanks to Ron Gogoi of the Lee MPO staff for his special efforts on this initiative.

This is a long term project that many of us will never see completed in our lifetime but it will be wonderful for our grandchildren. In the near future the Coast-to-Coast Trail will be completed and it will show everyone the incredible economic, mobility, and quality of life potential of a interconnected trail system. I for one can't wait!!

BikeWalkLee is an award-winning
volunteer community coalition with 70 supporter organizations raising public
awareness and advocating for complete streets in Lee County.Since our inception in 2009, we have been
strong supporters of the vision of a connected and integrated statewide trail
system throughout Florida.

We were an early supporter of the
River of Grass Greenway, which both Lee and Collier MPO Boards have made a
funding priority over the past 5 years.We also urged our Lee Legislative Delegation to support the 275 mile Coast-to-Coast
Trail from St. Petersburg to Cape Canaveral National Seashore.Our annual letter to the Lee Legislative
Delegation for the past four years has made bike tourism and the statewide
network of bike/ped paths, now called SunTrail, one of our top priorities.

In the Fall of 2014, the Florida
Greenways and Trails Foundation CEO, Dale Allen, made a well-received
presentation to a joint Lee/Collier MPO Board meeting about the vision of a
statewide trail system. This vision energized the MPO staff and advocates in
both counties to form a joint working group in early 2015 that developed the
best route for a regional trail in Southwest Florida, called the Southwest
Coast Connector (N2N).In early 2016 the
Lee MPO submitted grant applications for SunTrail funds to undertake two
projects on the Southwest Coast Connector--the Kismet Parkway shared use path
in Cape Coral, which would be part of the Charlotte Lee Hendry Trail; and funds
for the PD and E study for the last segment of the popular John Yarborough
Linear Park Trail in Fort Myers.Other
segments of the trail going through Lee County are either planned, programmed,
or existing.

We see bike tourism as a winning
economic development strategy for Florida.This lucrative niche market is especially attractive for international
travelers and a younger demographic.With Florida's temperate winters and flat terrain, the potential for
destination bike tourism has an enormous potential for high returns on our
investment in Florida.

Lee County's current Tour de Parks route

The $10 million federal TIGER
grant awarded in 2013 to the Lee MPO for its Complete Streets Initiative
Project will be completedby the end of
2016, setting the stage for enhanced economic benefits from bike tourism, which
would be greatly enhanced by a trail system that linked Lee County to Collier
County to the South and all the way to Tampa to the North.

TIGER Complete Streets Initiative

Bike tourism is already gaining
traction in Lee County with the recent completion of Cape Coral's 90-mile
bicycle routes system.By the end of
this year, there were be 14.3 miles of additional shared use paths as result of
the TIGER grant, increasing the current connected shared use path system in the
area (Lee County's Tour de Parks Loop) to a total of almost 50 miles.In addition, last year FDOT programmed funds
to conduct a PD and E study for a shared use path that will connect the Cape
Coral system to Pine Island, which already has a shared use path the length of
the island on Stringfellow Rd.This new 2.3
mile connection will connect the 90 mile system in Cape Coral to the 5.6 mile
path on Pine Island, creating almost 98 miles of a connected path system.

Cape Coral's 90 Mile Bicycle Route

Commitment to improving our
bike/ped facilities network and the safety of its users is a high priority by
both the elected bodies and communitiesin Lee County, as evidenced by our growing number of communities designated
as Bicycle Friendly Communities (BFC)--in 2014 Sanibel was elevated to Silver
status, and in 2015 Cape Coral was designated as a Bronze BFC.In the larger SWFL, there are two other
BFC's--Punta Gorda, joined by Naples in 2015.SWFL has worked hard over the past seven years to develop comprehensive
bike/ped programs, including expanding and improving the bike/ped network.SWFL is ready to take on the next big
challenge-- the Southwest Coast Connector Trail.

In summary, BikeWalkLee strongly
supports the Southwest Coast Connector, and urges the Florida Greenways and
Trails Council to select our region as the next portion of the statewide system
to work on.We look forward to working with all the
governmental and advocate partners in this regional initiative.

About BikeWalkLee Blog

This is the official Blog for BikeWalkLee.org. BikeWalkLee is a community coalition raising public awareness and advocating for complete streets in Lee County -- streets that are designed, built, operated and maintained for safe and convenient travel for all users: pedestrians, bicyclists, motorists, and transit riders of all ages and abilities.